Friday morning I woke up early as a man on a mission. Involved in the bumming around the city I did on Thursday was searching for an apartment. Specifically I was searching in the Loring Park area. I felt like I'd lived in Uptown for three years and I wanted to not simply return there. Loring Park is, like Uptown, very close to the city and populated by my peers. It seemed like the logical place to live when I moved back.
The place I found is a beautiful studio apartment on the east side of Loring Park on Spruce Place. Pete was nice enough to drive me there on Thursday night after we had pizza and upon seeing the place I was sold. Here are some of the photos from the Craig's List ad.
Bedroom and living room
Living room close-up
Kitchen
Bathroom
There was another girl who had taken an application too and so my mission was to be the first to get the application in. I got up really early to be at the rental office first thing in the morning and arrived just after they had opened which meant I was the first person to apply. I spent the rest of the day looking at other apartments in the area too just to make sure I was making the right choice and also to have some options in case things didn't work out. It was all unnecessary hedging though since I did get the apartment and just signed my lease this Friday.
I spent a lot of time in coffee shops during the day and after work Brian Bell came over to the Dunn Brothers where I was sitting and we went for a walk to chat. After we parted I went downtown to the Block E movie theater and saw two movies I'd previously missed back-to-back.
The first was "Hancock" and I thought it was alright for what it was, a "smart" summer blockbuster. You'll notice smart is in quotes. "Step Brothers" was not as great as "Anchorman" but also didn't feel as stilted as "Talladega Nights." It had a loose energy that worked at times and didn't at others. I did love Adam Scott who is always great at playing smarmy.
That evening I met up with an old family friend Nick and his new wife Lauren at their apartment in Loring Park. Nick's parents were in kindergarten together with my dad so you can imagine how far back our families go. They showed me photos of their wedding at the Grand Canyon, I told them about my reasons for moving back to Minnesota and we finished a bottle of wine. Later Dan and Hillary came over to hang out and then they took me home.
On Saturday morning Dan and I watched the USA-Spain with our step-cousin Nick. Well, it was more like Nick and I watched the US treat Spain like a red-headed stepchild while Dan checked out the back of his eyelids.
After the game I went to hang out with Will, Gerry and Emily. Will normally lives in San Francisco but was home to visit his parents. Gerry and Emily decided that just having him in the same time-zone was reason enough to drive to the Twin Cities. They came to pick me up and we went to St. Paul to have a barbeque with some of Will's high school friends. The rest of the night was spent kicking back beverages, bullshitting and watching videos on YouTube.
I was flying home on Sunday evening. So after we spent the morning like we had the day before with Dan catching some Zs and me watching the Olympics, he and I went for brunch at Zumbro Cafe with Hillary and then went to the pool until it was time to go to the airport.
The week home was energizing. It was both blissful because I got to see people I hadn't seen in a while and reassuring to know I was coming home to an entire network of friends. It's just two short weeks from today until I'll be home and I'm looking forward to enjoying the time here in Chicago as best I can and then enjoying being back home for keeps.
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